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Gulfport The recently approved tax bill is an abomination without any doubt. It’s claims of reform are a poorly crafted mask for a transfer of wealth from virtually all of us over the coming years to the coffers of the rich and corporations. Despite a couple of public relations stunts based largely on favorable tax savings when Verizon and Wells Fargo offered raises and bonuses to their workers, most economists are skeptical that any of these huge corporate savings will trickle down. Polls indicate that Americans think the bill stinks, and President Trump thinks it’s wonderful, so there we have it.

Nonetheless, one thing that is clear for individual and family taxpayers is that the standard deduction will rise for individuals from $6000 to $12000 and for couples to $24,000 beginning on January 1st, 2018. Without a doubt there are going to be some people who begin this roll with a smile on their faces.

There has been a quiet, but steady hum in the background though from charities of all places. Very little of their complaints are full voiced because the whining seems so unseemly, but increasingly some of the larger ones are wringing their hands more loudly because they aren’t happy that their appeals for tax deductible contributions will be so meaningless to those largely middle class families who might have made contributions thinking they would benefit by itemizing, but now won’t bother.

Me thinks they protest too much, even if this is only some static accompanied by the strident pitches of nonprofit public relations and marketing mavens. Particularly ironic are the voices of local community foundations since they are favored by the wealthy, who will do very well with these tax cuts, thank you so much. Itemized deductions were already largely a wealth preserve. The nonprofit Tax Foundation doesn’t mince its words on this issue, saying, “While the federal tax code generally imposes a much higher burden on high-income households, itemized deductions are an area of the tax code that mostly benefits the wealthy.”

The numbers bear that out. Only 6.5% of families making $25,000 or less itemize. According to the Tax Foundation, the vast majority don’t itemize:

30.1 percent of households chose to itemize their deductions (44 million returns). 68.5 percent of households chose to take the standard deduction (101 million returns). 1.6 percent of households had zero or negative adjusted gross income, and were unable to take any deductions. (2 million returns)

Additional research by the Foundation indicates that a majority only itemize once their income hits the $75 – $100,000 per year range, with 78.8% itemizing between $100-$200,000, and 93.5% itemizing over $200,000 per year. Pretty clear where these benefits lie. The impact of these Republican tax giveaways likely just means that more families with less than $100,000 to $150,000 won’t itemize, but those making $150,000 or more will still be doing so.

Lower income families already give a higher percentage of their incomes away according to most research, regardless of the tax benefits. Perhaps it is time for charities to start making their appeals based on their programs and benefits regardless of the supposed tax benefits, so that people give because they believe in the nonprofit’s mission rather than trying to stiff Uncle Sam. At the least they need to stop whining, because they are clearly crying wolf way too often since their rich donors will be doing very well thanks to the Republican’s special care for their interests.

Gulfport Berea College is as close as something comes to a one-of-a-kind, single institution, social change education experiment. Founded 162 years ago by abolitionists in Kentucky to educate freed slaves and lower income white students, to this day the college only admits lower income students. The Times reports that 98% of its classes use federal Pell grants and 64% are first time college students. Amazingly, all four years of college are tuition free for the students. Why don’t we have more college like this!

I’ve followed Berea at a distance with admiration. A former ACORN organizer in New Orleans moved to Berea when he fell for a local woman from there and always spoke of the town and the school with awe. Not being a college guy, I had looked them up back when and wondered why we didn’t recruit organizers there, and why they weren’t trying to get us to take summer interns, provide work study, and teach classes.

All of which surprised me to see Berea in the papers in an article connected to the Republican’s tax bill. Turned out Kentucky’s Senator and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell tried to put in a last minute carveout for Berea that would exempt them from paying the additional tax the bill had put on college endowments valued at over $500,000 per student. The target was the Ivy League schools and other big hitters like Stanford and the like. Turns out little Berea’s big, billion dollar plus endowment puts them at $700,000 per pupil. Anyway, Democrats like Bernie Sanders put a red flag on the item as not being budget related and breaking the rules. Now, Berea is in the middle of a partisan squabble as McConnell tries to put the horns on Sanders, and Sanders retorts that McConnell and the Repubs ought to support his bill making all college tuition free.

Somehow you know Berea is going to get a fix, but in the PT Barnum sense that “any publicity is good publicity,” let’s make the most of their moment in the sun, or storm, or whatever you want to call it. One thing that’s getting some more light as the sparks fly is that Berea is one of seven so-called “work colleges,” which is also interesting. The concept there is that students pledge to study and work throughout their time, arguably making them good-to-go for job skills and discipline when they matriculate, but also helping pay the bills in an equitable fashion without much, if any, student loan debt. Looking at the list of other schools, it’s a hill country kind of phenomena it seems with schools in North Carolina, Kentucky, southern Illinois and southern Missouri and Arkansas, including the College of the Ozarks.

Better to look at these brave few schools than the ones the Republicans really seem to love which are the for-profit college. Secretary of Education and for-profit college investor, Betty DeVos says that she is about to release her plan to renege on canceling the loan debt for students who were ripped off by the for-profit scamsters who made claims that they couldn’t deliver. Obama’s people were going to cancel out 100% of the debt, sticking it to the fraudulent institutions. DeVos wants a formula that exempts students who are making 50% less than others, but makes those making 50% or more of other graduates in their cohort to have to pay some share of the loans.

Let me get this straight. Republicans are claiming they love Berea which is about work, and Republicans also want to penalize students coming from ripoff schools who have taken the lemons, made lemonade, and are working.